He, she, they: gender goes beyond the binaries

“See the beauty, not the difference.” This is the message Dee Moore offers in contemplating a society in which concepts of gender have become increasingly open-ended.

“In some parts of the community, we are seen as breaking away from the natural order, or from the way we were made. To them, I want to say that I am as I was made, in all the glorious complexity that it brings. I have worked to get closer to my nature, not farther from it. And don’t underestimate how wonderfully complex our natures are – we are all complex, and multi-layered, and we were all made that way.”

Moore defines herself to the outside world as a “transgender woman”, and it’s clear cut. To the queer community, which understands better how complexity doesn’t invalidate “transness”, she is also “gender queer”, which in essence means she has great discomfort with the way we socialise gender and gender roles in general.

Moore isn’t alone in this discomfort with binary understandings of gender. More than ever, society is tackling head-on the nuances of what once posited as a black and white distinction between simply “he” and “she”.

“We are starting to understand that the binary we have imposed on gender [and on sex – which is a scientifically flawed notion] isn’t only incorrect, but also harmful to people,” says Dr Anastacia Tomson, a medical doctor, author, and activist. Tomson identifies as a woman, “wholly and utterly”, adding that since “it’s not in line with the sex that I was assigned at birth” she is also seen as “transgender”.

“It’s not as simple as saying, ‘Oh I’ve got X genitalia, so I’m this’. It’s not cut and dry like that; none of it is,” says Jacqui Benson, a Jewish and LGBTQIA+ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex, asexual), activist recently elected to the Cape South African Jewish Board of Deputies. She also runs a Facebook group called “Jewish LGBTQIA+ and Allies”.

A core part of understanding these shifts in gender identity and politics is in becoming familiar with the terminology used, much of it relatively new.

Clinical psychologist Judith Ancer says that the first core distinction is between gender and sexual orientation.

“Scientific research shows that while we still don’t have a full understanding about how gender identity or sexual orientation develops, what the best evidence we have indicates is that they largely seem to be biological, physiological realities.”

In a nutshell, says Ancer, “we are, as Lady Gaga says, born this way”.

“There have been claims made historically that gay or trans people were [linked to experiences of] a psychological trauma.” Science now completely refutes this, Ancer says. “There is absolutely no evidence in the research that gender identity has any link to how you parent or how you were raised”.

What is emerging was a link between gender and neurology. “Neuroscience indicates that there are brain differences in cisgender and transgender people.”

‘Cisgender’ refers to people who feel their gender matches that which they were assigned at birth, while ‘transgender’ refers to those who feel that the gender with which they were born doesn’t reflect their sense of self.

Thus, while biological markers such as genitalia, hormones, and chromosomes have largely served as distinguishers of gender, science is beginning to suggest, if anything, that gender is born not in body parts but in the brain.

Ancer says that while there is currently hype about the label of “rapid onset gender dysphoria” – a phenomenon of children suddenly deciding they are the wrong gender – this isn’t an accurate reflection of reality.

“Rapid onset gender dysphoria isn’t a condition recognised by any mainstream medical organisation. It’s a term that was used largely coming out of the Christian right-wing and anti-trans extreme feminists who feel like transwomen are trying to take over women’s spaces.”

People that are truly transgender don’t suddenly have these feelings.

“For most children that are transgender, it’s a feeling that they’ve had from very little – before they needed to be cool or were on WhatsApp or watching TikTok videos. Research finds that there is quite a persistence of that feeling from childhood into adulthood.

“When it comes to truly transgender children, their parents have known [about it], and if they haven’t, they’ve been in deep denial. These are the kids who, when they are very little, don’t feel okay in the world. Maybe [now] there is just a greater freedom to express it.”

This is echoed by Tomson, who recalls understanding “from a young age that I was different, but I didn’t know how I was different”. For Moore, it was as she entered adolescence, that she felt confusion, “because I didn’t know that it was possible to be like me. I felt alone and worried that I was broken.”

Ancer notes the turmoil of stigma and emotional upheaval faced by the trans community. “The cost in the world of being transgender is so high, no one chooses it just to make a fashion statement.”

Instead, even once a person identifies that they are transgender, there will be a range of ways in which they will affirm this understanding. “It’s about a careful thinking with that kid and their family.”

Tomson recalls the lengthy journey towards finding her way to her true self. “It was a difficult and often painful process, accompanied by a not-insignificant amount of loss; but it was also the only way to remain true to myself. I had so much to learn in order to be able to put together the pieces around who I am at my core, and once those fell into place, I was able to grow into myself.”

Ancer says it’s also important to differentiate between the idea of being transgender and refusal to conform to binary gender labels.

“The apparent explosion of trans doesn’t involve very many people if you really look at it. What you see an explosion of is children who are saying that they are gender-non-conforming, which isn’t the same.”

“The gender non-conformist doesn’t necessarily want to change their hormones. They might want to dress in a certain way.

“This is linked to ideas of being gender non-binary or gender queer – the idea of ‘I’m androgynous’ – somewhere in the middle of everything. This notion of queer identity is more fluid and more a sense of wanting freedom. There are some kids who I think use it as a way of potentially challenging convention and authority. It’s also about personal expression.”

Ultimately, says Ancer, “it’s about looking at each person in their story”.

Furthermore, while there might be a perception that there is suddenly much greater confusion about gender than ever before, Benson points out that the questions regarding gender aren’t new, rather “it’s the fact that we have a language to it now that we didn’t have then”.

Ancer concurs, “I think that more people talk about it because they have more safety to talk about it.”

Recent shifts of pronoun usage, in which some people ask to be called by a singular “they” rather than “he” or “she”, is simply about respect, suggests Ancer. “It’s asking society just to be a little bit more mindful.”

She quips, “The human species has managed to land a person on the moon and get them back without dying. We are super clever. I think we can all get used to saying ‘they’.”

For Moore, there has been an uplifting change in the media representation of transgender and gender-non-conforming people. “Nowadays, there are a number of TV shows and movies about transgender people starring transgender people. It’s a lot more common to see gender questioning characters and queer relationships depicted positively on screen.”

Being able to see these characters empowers people possibly grappling with their own gender identities and informs others about this experience. “It helps that people don’t see me as alien and ‘other’ because they’ve seen depictions in media of similar people.”

Both Moore and Tomson have found a sense of connection with their Jewish identity and gender.

“For me, Judaism is a joining point of the rational and the emotional. Before I came to terms with being a woman, I emphasised the rational too much and put more weight in it than in my emotions. Having accepted my gender, I feel it’s balanced and reflected better in Judaism,” says Moore.

Tomson says that she sees “all of us, as members of the LGBTQIA+ community, not as flawed or broken, but as being created, like all of humanity, b’Tzelem Elokim – our diversity is an expression of divinity, not an affront to it.”